Now, we should note that the report wasn’t exactly a candidate for journalistic excellence, but then, what cable news report ever is?

Megyn Kelly, host of her own show on Fox, led off the report saying the board rejected a “desperate request from a local veterans group to keep the Pledge.”

Later, reporter Trace Gallagher said this: “The veterans, by the way, Megyn, are not giving up. They will continue fighting to see if they can get the Pledge reinstated back at Sioux Falls High School.”

Yeah, Sioux Falls High School. Mascot: T. Denny Sanford.

But the most egregious error came when Kelly and Gallagher implied that the board voted to stop the practice of saying the Pledge in high schools. In fact, the board extended its existing policy of requiring elementary school students to say the Pledge each day by also including middle school students. The board declined to extend that policy to high schools on grounds that high schools are less structured.

So then I get an email from a nice lady that I know. She’s out of state, she explained, traveling with a group of veterans. They saw the Fox report. They were outraged. When I explained what happened, she had her own explanation: They assumed high school students already were saying the Pledge each day, and they were upset to learn they weren’t.

All of this underscores a simple axiom of politics: Don’t mess with veterans. Even the perception that you’re disrespecting veterans — and board members went to great lengths to say they weren’t — invites big-time backlash.

(Page 2 of 2)

Outraged people on the Internet passed around the email addresses of the board members. They’ve no doubt received plenty of correspondence on this issue and have retreated to their bunker. Silly board members: Veterans know how to clear bunkers.

There are, to me, a couple ways to look at this issue. The veterans think that high schoolers will show respect and appreciation for their country and the people who have defended its quickly receding freedoms (think NSA spying) by saying the Pledge each day.

Let’s face it: A lot of older people don’t have a favorable impression of high schoolers, with all their texting and socializing and disrespect. They think that forcing the little hoodlums to say the Pledge might instill some respect and appreciation for the hard work and sacrifice it’s taken to get America to where it is today, namely, a bankrupt, economically depressed, rapidly expanding police state.

And don’t even try to make the argument to Pledge supporters that high schoolers don’t have the time to say the Pledge, as some board members tried to do. As Fox News’ Kelly helpfully pointed out, “They have time for sex education.”

OK, so the argument that high schoolers would acquire a deeper appreciation for their country with daily recitals of the Pledge is a fair one. It probably would work for some.

But I have my doubts as to its widespread benefits. Because if you’re going to express your appreciation to the country, don’t you need to know about the country?

We’ve all probably laughed at the dopes on TV who are stopped on the street and asked questions about current events and history. You know the ones: The people who think Hitler started the Civil War; the ones who can’t name the president or the three branches of the federal government. The people who think King George brought a keg of beer to the Boston Tea Party.

The reality is, our schools by and large have done a poor job of teaching civics in general and history in particular. In 2010, when the National Center for Education Statistics did one of its periodic surveys of students and their knowledge of history, only 12 percent — 12 percent! — were performing at or above the proficient level.

So the veterans and their advocates are well-intentioned. But, until students get more out of civics classes, count me as someone skeptical about the daily benefits of saying the Pledge.